A new gold rush pits money and jobs against California’s environment

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Elizabeth Holley contributed to this article about how companies are seeking to open old mines and explore in new sensitive regions, amid resistance from Californians who want the Gold Rush to remain part of history.  There is still a lot of gold in these hills and a lot of money at stake. But across California, a strong environmental ethos and, in many historic places, an economic shift toward tourism are now sharply at odds with the resumption of gold mining, despite its promise of new jobs more than a century and a half after tens of thousands of migrants arrived to strike it rich in this state on the country’s edge.  July 17, 2022.